


Obvious Things, Unobserved

by bloodfever



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Courferre Week, M/M, Pining Combeferre
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-15
Updated: 2015-09-15
Packaged: 2018-04-20 22:28:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4804535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bloodfever/pseuds/bloodfever
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Combeferre has had a lot of practice at being in love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Obvious Things, Unobserved

Combeferre has had a lot of practice at being in love.  Most of the time he finds that it is like a buoy more than a flame – it holds him up gently, is a safe place to rest.  He certainly isn’t the proverbial moth.

(He was very proud of that one.)

Most of the time Combeferre finds such quiet contentment in his feelings that the fact they are unrequited doesn’t actually touch him.  He can watch Courfeyrac from across the room, and feel nothing but warmth and happiness. Beautiful things aren’t meant to be captured anyway; the delight is in just getting to watch.  Most of the time their friendship is so fundamental, so natural, that his feelings just seem like the inevitable extension.  Most of the time their rapport leaves him comforted and steady, and he is confident in his feelings and in his decision to keep them to himself.  Most of the time.

There are days when Courfeyrac, even pure sunshine like Courfeyrac, is tired or sad, all slumped shoulders and dark clouds in his eyes.  Combeferre longs to be able to do something  _more_ , than just hum sympathetically and be there while Courfeyrac slides deeper into himself.  Combeferre’s heart breaks, and the pieces are jagged against his pericardial cavity.  There are days when Courfeyrac flirts with someone, or favours someone else with a smile, or a joke, and Combeferre cannot fight the irrationality that is feeling like he will never be enough.  His heart has been broken and patched back together so many times now it’s practically a mosaic.

All it will take is a moment of eye contact and a genuine smile, and Combeferre is steady, buoyed again. A warmth so thorough and complete he cannot fathom putting it at risk by declaring himself.  Or a heart in pieces so sharp he cannot imagine anything other than hopelessness.  It’s a conundrum.  It’s a riddle.  Combeferre incidentally has a lot of practice at riddles (even the ridiculous), so he does the only thing he can.  

Combeferre loves Courfeyrac, quietly, warmly, and occasionally incredibly painfully, and he waits for a solution to present itself.

_Any day now._

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Arthur Conan Doyle. Er, after a fashion.
> 
> Come say hi at [prometheusatthebarricade](http://prometheusatthebarricade.tumblr.com) :D.


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